50 Greatest Super Heroes In Comic Book History

28. Mr. Fantastic

(Write-up by Nick Tylwalk, Bam Smack Pow Editor)

Nerds take heed: sometimes the brainy guy does become the hero and get the girl.

The thing with Reed Richards is that even though he knows a lot of things, there’s no way he could have foreseen becoming the leader of a famous group of super heroes and ending up with the woman of his dreams, one who also happens to be a super hero. As miscalculations go, the uncharacteristic one he made about the flight that turned he and his friends into the Fantastic Four turned out to be a pretty good one — except for Ben Grimm, of course, but it’s to Reed’s credit that he’s never stopped trying to figure out a way to free him from a life stuck as the Thing.

There’s probably a lesson in there about the need for the guy with the stretchable body to be resilient. It’s actually a really cool super power too, when you think about it. Certainly not as showy as the Human Torch’s pyrotechnics or as powerful as his wife’s force fields, but it allows him to tackle problems creatively the same way he does with his nearly unparalleled brain.

Longtime fans also know that while Reed worships at the altar of intellect, he’s not a slave to it. Threaten his family, his world or his entire reality and he’s capable of doing the passionately heroic thing even if it’s not the optimal path to a solution. And when he tips a little too far toward being cold and scientific, he’s always got the rest of the FF to steer him back on course.

Next: No. 27: The Merc with a Mouth